A Toast For Revenge

Luke came home and found Jess chopping onion wearing a huge black eyeglass. The eyeglasses look ugly but it looks fashionable in Jess. 

"What's with all these onion chopping frenzies? Did Noah leave you unsatisfied?"

"Shut up!" she pointed the knife at him, "Why are you late?" she asked. 

"Well, I was worried that I would disturb the two of you," he widened his eyes on her, "Sorry." 

"It was a good thing you disturb us," she mumbled under her breath but Luke still heard it clearly.

"You two was really… going into it." he chucked. "It was so hot, I got thirsty." 

Jess didn't answer Luke's teasing but she felt her face heat up in embarrassment. She never wanted for Luke to see that, however, she forgot that Luke was in the house! 

"Sorry, I thought you already left," she said, putting a deep pan to boil some water for the pasta. 

"I had to email someone and the files were on my computer, so I went out later." he smiled apologetically, "... besides you shouldn't apologize. This is your house, I'm just freeloading here."

"You are not freeloading. I'm slaving you off." she chuckled. Luke does most of the cooking for the two of them, for she only knows how to prepare a sandwich and cook pasta. 

Without Luke in the house, she survived eating fruits or simply eating out. But today, she is cooking the only thing she could cook -- pasta!

Her favorite seafood carbonara. 

Luke watched her saute the onion into a pan, and put every seafood they have in the freezer. 

"By the way, Professor Boa asked me to tell you that he would like to talk to you in his office, probably tomorrow," he said. 

"Professor Boa? Did he say why?" she poured herself some wine, thinking she was already done with her report and she doesn't want to go back to uni, not until the new semester starts.

"He didn't say. But I have a feeling it was something important." he poured himself a glass of wine too. Seeing that  Jess pasta was almost done. 

"I wonder what he wants," she pouted with the idea that she had to go to the uni tomorrow when she planned to lie in bed all day.

"Another thing, since you'll be in the uni tomorrow, there is a swarming rumor between you and Noah." 

"Ugh! Those bitches really won't stop with their garbage talk." 

Luke went quiet as he attacked the seafood carbonara. Though Jess isn't good at cooking, she could cook as long it is pasta. 

"Those two were saying that there was a video of Noah and I leaving the lab together, and now they made up this annoying story that I got accepted to ANAT Pharma and Co because I seduced Noah," she clicked her tongue. 

"The nerve! I don't think Noah needs to be seduced! The poor guy was like a fly caught on honey already, what's there to seduce?" he said in exaggeration. 

Jess fork stopped midway hearing what Luke said, "You think so?" 

He laughed seeing Jess getting serious with his stupid joke. "Why? Are you ready to admit that you are falling for the guy?" he wiggled his eyebrows as he teasingly asked her. 

"I want him to fall for me so I could dump his sorry ass," she said, pouring herself another glass of wine.

"Is the operation revenge back on the table?" he was surprised to hear Jess talking about dumping Noah.

"You saw us, right? He kissed me so many times in a way that I thought my soul left my body, yet he still doesn't remember me."

"How in the fuck world is that even possible?" Luke put down his fork and squinted his eyes on Jess. "Are you sure it was Noah that you sleep with that night?" his voice and face were full of doubt. 

"That hurts, you know that right?" she told him feeling vindicated. "I was a virgin. And I would admit now that when it comes to Noah, I simply lost my mind. But need I remind you, I have a high IQ. I'm not that stupid not to recognize the man I held in my arms that night!" 

"Well then, Noah was a moronic bastard! He held you more than once in his arms and still he couldn't remember you? Did you ask him if the duration of the time you first slept together and the time you met each other again, was he involved in some kind of accident where he lost his stupid memory or something like that?" 

"There was nothing like that," she muttered under her breath. "I hope it was like that, but it's not." 

"Damn! That was just fucked up." he exhaled a breath of frustration, and he felt pity over the pain that was registered on Jess' face.

"Let's do that revenge then!" he declared pumping his fist in the air, "How are we going to do it?"

"From what happened earlier, Noah likes me, right?." 

"Well, duh? Is the sky blue? Does the sun set on the West?" he asked with incredulity. "It's pretty obvious that he has the hots for you! Anybody that has eyes can see that!" 

She put down her wine glass not so gently that the wine spilled on the table. 

"That's what makes it so fucking infuriating! You know what I mean?" 

"Let's talk about this revenge plan of you tomorrow. It seemed like you drank a lot of wine even before you start cooking." 

"You should have listened to the words that came out of Noah's mind, and tell me how I'm not yet a murderer!" 

Noah's words made her heart jumped out of her chest, how a single glance from his blue eyes was enough to plunge her into an abyss of desire, or the way his fingers slid in her skin could make her lost her mind. 

'But why, he couldn't remember her?!' her eyes watered in frustration.

"I've decided that to make us even, I will return to him twice what he has given me." she raised her glass of wine for a toast.